Massimo was staring raptly at the TV blonde as he awaited his sandwich.

“Massimo, pay attention. If you leak something that advanced, that radical… a chip like that could change the world’s military balance of power. Never mind Olivetti. Big American spy agencies with three letters in their names will come calling.”

Massimo scratched his dirty scalp and rolled his eyes in derision. “Are you so terrorized by the CIA? They don’t read your sorry little one-man tech blog.”

This crass remark irritated me keenly. “Listen to me, boy genius: do you know what the CIA does here in Italy? We’re their ‘rendition’ playground. People vanish off the streets.”

“Anybody can ‘vanish off the streets.’ I do that all the time.”

I took out my Moleskin notebook and my shiny Rotring technical pen. I placed them both on the Elena’s neat little marble table. Then I slipped them both back inside my jacket. “Massimo, I’m trying hard to be sensible about this. Your snotty attitude is not helping your case with me.”

With an effort, my source composed himself. “It’s all very simple,” he lied. “I’ve been here a while, and now I’m tired of this place. So I’m leaving. I want to hand the future of electronics to an Italian company. With no questions asked and no strings attached. You won’t help me do that simple thing?”

“No, of course I won’t! Not under conditions like these. I don’t know where you got that data, what, how, when, whom, or why… I don’t even know who you are! Do I look like that kind of idiot? Unless you tell me your story, I can’t trust you.”

He made that evil gesture: I had no balls. Twenty years ago-well, twentyfive-and we would have stepped outside the bar. Of course I was angry with him-but I also knew he was about to crack. My source was drunk and he was clearly in trouble. He didn’t need a fist-fight with a journalist. He needed confession.